Trade War Has Canadian Investors Flocking to Floating-Rate Debt

Canadian, American and Quebec flags at the Canada-US border in St-Bernard-de-Lacolle, Quebec, Canada.

Photographer: Graham Hughes/Bloomberg
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Bond investors in Canada are clamoring for floating-rate debt, with issuance this year on pace to be the highest in a decade as traders bet that a trade war with the US will drive up inflation.

Companies have sold more than $20 billion of floating-rate notes in the Canadian bond market as of March 11, more than twice the volume in the same period last year, and the most going back more than a decade, according to data from LSEG.